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Seattle police have charged a 44-year-old ex-con with the stabbing of another man in the stomach from behind in a “seemingly unprovoked attack” in the city’s Chinatown-International District, authorities said, the latest in a string of violent crimes across the U.S. linked to repeat-offender suspects.
Surveillance video appears to show a man on a bicycle approach another man and stab him without warning before running off. The victim, who was pulling a cart along the sidewalk at the time, falls to the ground but eventually gets up and tries to run after the suspect while holding his side.
He couldn’t keep up, but police arrested 44-year-old Jose Francisco Garcia nearby. Court records show he has a rap sheet dating back to at least 1997, when he was convicted of third-degree assault, and he had pending drug charges from November.
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This still image taken from surveillance video shows the moment before a Seattle man was stabbed in the stomach from behind in what police called an “unprovoked attack.” The victim was walking with a cart in the Chinatown-International District when a man approached him from behind. The suspect was arrested nearby a few minutes later after allegedly trying to flee from police on a bicycle. (Seattle Police Department)
He allegedly fled the scene on a bicycle before officers arrived. Police told Fox News Digital that responding officers captured him within 9 minutes of the 911 call — and police dash and bodycam videos show he tried to escape from marked police cruisers on his bicycle before they surrounded and tackled him.
Bodycam video shows police recovered a knife tucked into his waistband when they captured him. It appears to be a small, fixed-blade weapon with Paracord wrapped around the handle.
WATCH: Unprovoked broad daylight Seattle stabbing caught on video
Francisco Garcia was charged with first-degree assault, a felony that carries up to life in prison as a maximum sentence if convicted, and detectives were still investigating.
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His most recent prior charge was possession of a controlled substance in November. Before that, he was convicted of fourth-degree assault, harassment, and obstructing law enforcement.
A still image taken from dashcam video shows the alleged suspect attempting to flee responding officers by riding his bike the wrong way through traffic. He was arrested moments later. (Seattle Police Department)
Mike Solan, president of the Seattle Police Officers Guild, said the city’s propensity to keep letting suspects like Francisco Garcia walk is due to pressure from “unreasonable activists.” And that hurts morale, he said, with the department staffing down by about 700 officers over the past 10 years.
“It’s an absolute detriment to our entire nation’s public safety,” he said.
Read the rap sheet:
“This is another example of soft-on-crime policies and laws that impact the community at large,” Solan said. “And then, as a trickle-down effect to police officers on the street, normal citizens are fed up with the crime and the blight, and they want to take their cities back.”
The rap sheet includes multiple other assault charges, including drunken driving, unlawful possession of a firearm, attempting to disarm a law enforcement officer, resisting arrest, theft and more. Juvenile cases were not included in the documentation.
Bodycam video shows the moment Seattle police said they recovered a knife from the suspect’s belt. (Seattle Police Department)
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In Oregon, he was also convicted of aggravated harassment, criminal mischief, disorderly conduct and other charges.
Firefighters rushed the victim, identified only as a 40-year-old man, to Harborview Medical Center in serious condition.
This still image taken from surveillance video shows the Seattle intersection near the crime scene. Police said their Real Time Crime Center captured the incident on video and that a suspect tried to flee on a bike but was arrested within 9 minutes of the 911 call. (Seattle Department of Transportation)
The stabbing is just one in a string of violent crimes in the Chinatown-International District area, FOX 13 Seattle reported. A man and woman were injured in two separate shootings in the past month.
Then on Monday night, police responded to another shooting in the same neighborhood that left a man dead and another injured.
But Seattle isn’t the only city facing a rash of violence linked to repeat offenders.
In Charlotte last month, Decarlos Brown Jr., a 34-year-old with a history of mental illness and more than a dozen prior charges, allegedly stabbed 23-year-old Iryna Zarutska in the neck from behind in an unprovoked attack on a light rail train on Aug. 22, according to authorities.
Iryna Zarutska curls up in fear as a man looms over her during a disturbing attack on a Charlotte, N.C. light rail train. (NewsNation via Charlotte Area Transit System)
Before the attack, he’d been released without bail for a prior misdemeanor charge of allegedly misusing the 911 system.
Zarutska bled to death on a train car full of bystanders. Brown faces first-degree murder in North Carolina as well as a federal charge of committing an act causing death on a mass transportation system.
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“It’s an unreasonable activist push to reform the criminal justice system that put most of blue cities in this predicament that, to me, is sad and needs to be corrected, really quick,” Solan said.